It is also worth running over the various earning rates. For simplicity, I have separated these into ‘best American Express card for earning Avios’ and ‘best Mastercard / Visa for earning Avios’.

Before you apply for anything, though, consider the size of the sign-up bonus and annual fee as well as the earning rate. Some cards offer a better sign-up deal if you are referred rather than apply direct – you will find full details of referral deals on the ‘Credit Cards Update‘ page of HFP.

Let me be very clear on one point. I am not suggesting that the best use for the points from all of these cards is to transfer to Avios. Frankly, you’d be crazy to convert 50,000 Hilton points to 5,000 Avios when you could get a valuable hotel stay out of them. However, I have listed all of the options for completeness.

This article does not factor in the value of long-term incentives such as the British Airways American Express Premium Plus 2-4-1 voucher or the IHG Rewards Club Premium MasterCard free night voucher. You should also think about these perks when deciding where to put your long-term spending.

Best sign-up bonus (20000 points) for a ‘free for first year’ card. 1 Membership Rewards point = 1 Avios. You also receive double points on foreign and airline spend. You get 10,000 bonus points on renewal when you spend £15,000 per card year, equivalent to an extra 0.66 points per £1. Full review.

Best overall card for long-term spending due to the value of the 2-4-1 Avios redemption voucher. Double points on British Airways spend (3 per £1) plus the 2-4-1 Avios redemption voucher when spending £10,000 per year. Representative APR 76.0% variable including £195 fee based on a notional £1200 credit limit. Full review.

Best card for foreign spending due to the 0% FX fee. Card also has no foreign exchange fees on overseas spending, voucher to upgrade one return Avios flight by one class when spending £7,000 per year. Representative APR 23.7% variable including £24 fee based on a notional £1200 credit limit. Full review.

Best Visa / MasterCard if you meet the qualifying criteria. This card is only available to HSBC Premier current account holders and requires substantial savings or investment products to be held with HSBC to qualify. Representative APR 59.3% variable including £195 fee based on a notional £1200 credit limit. Full review.

1 Clubcard point per £4 spent per transaction. 1,000 Clubcard points convert into 2,400 Avios. Note that your actual earnings rate will be lower because each transaction is rounded down to the nearest £4, offset by the fact that you earn quadruple points for shopping in Tesco. Representative APR 56.5% variable including £150 fee based on a notional £1200 credit limit. Full review.

This card is only available to HSBC Premier current account holders and requires substantial savings or investment products to be held with HSBC to qualify. Representative APR 18.9% variable. Full review.

Best free Visa / MasterCard for earning Avios points. 1 Clubcard point per £8 spent per transaction. 1,000 Clubcard points convert into 2,400 Avios. Note that your actual earnings rate will be lower because each transaction is rounded down to the nearest £8, offset by the fact that you earn double points for shopping in Tesco. Representative APR 18.9% variable. Full review.

Card also has no foreign exchange fees on overseas spending, voucher to upgrade one return Avios flight by one class when spending £7,000 per year. Comes as a double-pack with the Amex discussed above. Representative APR 23.7% variable including the £24 fee based on a notional £1200 credit limit. Full review.

Disclaimer: Head for Points is a journalistic website. Nothing here should be construed as financial advice, and it is your own responsibility to ensure that any product is right for your circumstances. Recommendations are based primarily on the ability to earn miles and points and do not consider interest rates, service levels or any impact on your credit history. By recommending credit cards on this site, I am – technically – acting as a credit broker. Robert Burgess, trading as Head for Points, is regulated and authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority to act as a credit broker.

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Comments

O/T – “Spend £2,000 by 23 Jul 2017 to receive 30,000 points” says my wife’s Platinum card online account. Should it not be 35,000 points for this spend ??? Did it at the weekend, so just waiting for points to post then to cancel the card. FYI. the £450 fee has been charged to it since we activated it on Friday evening……

if you have a gold card you have the lounge club card, not priority pass (which comes with the plat).

The lounge pass card bills £15 to your gold card, so wont work without it. I’m not sure if it works without a card if you still have your 2 free visits BUT I remember reading a post that it doesnt as the two cards are tightly linked.

O/T – My Amex Gold year is up tomorrow, so will have the 10k bonus hit my account at some point. Thoughts on upgrading to Platinum to grab my offered 15k points for £2k spend then cancel (as I don’t need travel insurance, I’ve got 5 visits of Priority Pass left directly) so no real need for full year of Amex Plat just yet. Just means buying points for say 1-2 months of the Amex fee and then sign up in 6 months again.

Does anyone know how long referral MR’s should take to arrive after acceptance please ?

I referred MrsS for Gold from my Platinum account rather than pay the fee. She got the acceptance email straight away on Sunday but nothing has hit my account yet. Does it make a difference that I didn’t refer like for like ?

Hi – can you get the referral bonus when applying for a Lloyds Avios Duo if you have a Halifax Clarity and ISA (but no current account) – i.e. is the definition of “customer” someone who holds any account?

It isn’t clear because the criteria are not published – Lloyds won’t even admit publicly that it blocks existing customers. My gut feeling is you won’t get a referral. Put it this way – I know people who cancelled a Lloyds credit card 7-8 years ago and were refused a refer a friend bonus. Halifax current accounts are also definitely a no-no so it is hard to see why a Halifax credit card would be OK.

You can do it but the work around is too complex. Fundamentally if Lloyds recognises the email used for the referral then it doesn’t get sent out. If you use a different email and they recognise you when you apply, you don’t get the bonus. You can get around this by persuading Avios that it is a mistake and then add them ex-gratia but it is a pain and I don’t encourage it.

Remember that Lloyds doesn’t publicise the referral scheme and it is run primarily for the benefit of HFP readers

OT: WARNING In the past hour I’ve received two separate email witb avios logos etc confirming transfer from something called abas and ucount. I have never heard of these and email contained no personal information. Take care not to click any buttons in these emails and just delete them if received.

I seem to be grandfathered in to 2 MR points per £1 with American Express. I signed up about 7 years ago with an Amex Platinum Business Card, and ever since I get the same reward rate on all subsequent new cards (incl both AMEX Platinum and Gold) that I take out for other staff in my company. I can’t find much online about this earning rate, but wondered if you ever come across these rates for new signups?